GOP lawmaker: US should trumpet ISIS body count

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) says the administration should publicize the deaths of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) forces in order to deter potential followers from joining the terror group.

“Ten thousand people are dead. If you join ISIS, there’s a great chance you will die, too, and show the living conditions of ISIS soldiers. Not just a bunch of guys running around with AK-47s, having a good time pillaging towns,” Kinzinger, a former Air Force pilot, said in an interview Wednesday night with Fox News’s “On The Record.”

“It’s actually a very devastating way to live. I think we have to show that more,” he added. “This, to me, does not say we are winning the fight. This says we are killing some people.”

On Wednesday, Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a French radio station that the now 9-month-old coalition campaign against ISIS has killed more than 10,000 fighters since August.

“Indeed, when you act against a force like Daesh, which is a terrorist force with a totalitarian ideology, and that does not fear death, we recorded an enormous loss for Daesh. More than 10,000 since this campaign started. And this will eventually have an effect,” he claimed, using the Arab term for the terror group.

In March, Gen. Lloyd Austin, the U.S. Central Command chief, told the House Armed Services Committee that the U.S.-led campaign had killed 8,500 ISIS fighters.

Kinzinger guessed the latest figure was an “estimate,” since the U.S. doesn’t have personnel on the ground performing assessments after every airstrike.